Is the Catholic/Orthodox separation on Easter a big deal? About half the time the dates are separated by a week. One-fourth of the time, as in 2013, it’s about a month. Otherwise we’re aligned 25% of the time. How did things get out of whack on such a basic Christian thing?

Why now and not earlier? Who knows? Vatican II endorsed the idea of a single celebration of Easter across Christendom. The last bishops’ synod endorsed the idea, repeatedly. Obviously, we’d need to get all of the Reformation Churches with the program, too. A lot of them took a century or two to adopt Pope Gregory XIII’s initiative. Britain and its colonies came aboard in 1752. Here’s a good trivia question: which was the last US state to align with the other states in the Gregorian reform? Hint: it was before its own statehood.